The Pterodactyl Hunters in the Gilded City

(Hardback)

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"Action (and angst) in the great pulp tradition, delivered with a sure hand and a dancing line. Keep your eye on this cartoonist!"--Mark Newgarden, author of We All Die Alone and Bow-Wow Bugs a Bug Brendan Leach's Pterodactyl Hunters in the Gilded City, a Best American Comics selection and winner of the Xeric Award and Ignatz Award for Outstanding Comic, is a story of sibling rivalry and family tradition in a rapidly changing world: a version of 1904 New York where generations of working-class hot air balloonists take to the skies each night to defend their city from pterodactyls. Brendan Leach is an Ignatz and Xeric Award winning Cartoonist and Illustrator. He is the author of the graphic novel Iron Bound, counted on Print magazine's best books of 2013. Leach's illustrations have appeared in print in the New York Times, Time Out New York, Time Out New York Kids, and the L Magazine, online at moleskine.com and xbox.com, and on ESPN's Sportscenter. His work has been recognized by 3x3 Magazine and the Society of Illustrators.

Reviews

"Gilded age dinosaur hunters might sound like one of DC's old Silver Age larks, but Leach approaches it with a literary sensibility, pinpointing the jealousy, shame and fear that motivates and paralyzes the younger brother. If pterodactyls really did plague the gilded age, this is the story Stephen Crane would've written about the intermittently brave men who undertook the fight. Leach's scratchy, cartoony artwork probably would have been sneered at back then, but it's a strikingly distinctive style for a newcomer." - Paste Magazine

"It's wonderful to imagine that New York at the turn of the 20th century may still be living under the threat of prehistoric pterodactyls. Brendan Leach's story starts out with that great concept. In 1905, it seems that only two or three pterodactyls remain, most recently thanks to Eamon Sullivan, a true-hearted hero of the city. Maybe more proud-hearted than true, Eamon is the hero of New York City as he carries on the family business and kills every pterodactyl that he can. And he's going to kill them all before his younger brother Declan has a chance to even find out if he could be half the civic hero that Eamon is... ...So instead of telling a story about something fantastic and magical like dinosaurs, Leach builds a very personal story about all of our doubts of what we're going to be when we grow up." - Newsarama

"Leach, who I know almost nothing about other than that he's the guy who drew a comic about a pterodactyl that some people once told me was worth a look, draws this comic like it's a low-budget punk rock sci-fi action sequence with a beginning, middle, and end. It's raw-looking and energetic, and relatively thin on subtext, but the plot whizzes along and it's basically a neo-punk-noir mind-swap crime movie on paper. It's genre trash as end effect, and it doesn't get in its own way." - CBR

"This is a really gorgeous and unique story... ...It feels like the perfect means of delivery for a story so rooted in history, antique ideals and sensationalism." - Daily Crosshatch

"Despite the pleasing visuals, the story is the greatest strength of the work. The setting, the characters, and the narrative drive are all top notch. The story's world has existed for years, but it is this particular moment of internal and external crisis that creates the reason for the story. The Pterodactyl Hunters in the Gilded City is a literary story told using the comics medium. There's plenty of action driving the story along, but its conclusion is as complex as the mixed emotions of its heroic watchman." - Midnight Fiction

Author Bio

Brendan Leach is an Ignatz and Xeric Award winning Cartoonist and Illustrator. His comics have been published by Secret Acres, Top Shelf Comics, and Retrofit Comics. Brendan's illustration work has been recognized by the Society of Illustrators and 3x3 Magazine, and his comics have been included in many collections and anthologies, including Best American Comics 2011. He used to drive a Zamboni in New Jersey, now he draws pictures in Brooklyn, NY.